


With the color of its thoughts

by asuralucier



Category: Call Me By Your Name (2017)
Genre: Character Study, Divorce, Gen, Hopeful Ending, M/M, Oliver needs a hug, Oliver pov, Parenthood, Post-Film, and a big breakfast
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-26
Updated: 2020-12-26
Packaged: 2021-03-11 01:27:47
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,093
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28286970
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/asuralucier/pseuds/asuralucier
Summary: Oliver runs into Annella again in New York.
Relationships: Oliver & Annella Perlman, Oliver/Elio Perlman
Comments: 16
Kudos: 107
Collections: Yuletide 2020





	With the color of its thoughts

**Author's Note:**

  * For [starfishstar](https://archiveofourown.org/users/starfishstar/gifts).



> Title taken from Marcus Aurelius - “The soul becomes dyed with the color of its thoughts.”

When I first spot Mrs. P. - Annella - waiting in line for a taxi cab a block or two away from Washington Square, I feel a sense of immense guilt pooling at the pit of my stomach for which my physician has prescribed antacid tablets. Although I am barely thirty, my doctorate, my divorce, and the small-scale war being waged in my department between colleagues have all conspired together to make me an old man. 

Even now, it’s difficult for me to fathom Annella as a mother. She was too _much_ a person, wholly and unapologetically herself. So was Pro, though in a different way. Neither of them, by virtue of their personhoods have left various wounds on their son, but some of the wounds that Elio keeps inside of him are undoubtedly by my hand. I have been thinking of it less lately, of how I’d wounded him.

Too late, Annella seems to have spotted me. But as she walks towards me, I’m rooted to the spot, unable to move. Usually, I am quick to avoid confrontations and even quicker to run away from my problems. 

“... _Oliver_? My goodness, I barely recognize you! To think I’d run into you here.” 

I live near here in a two-bedroom apartment. The second bedroom used to be a study, but I recently had it converted back into a bedroom again for my sons when they stayed over. Next to Annella’s carefully put-together autumn outfit, a light red coat with a smooth silk scarf tucked into it, I feel woefully underdressed. It’s not too cold outside yet, but she must be acclimated to warmer weather. I look down at myself in my jogging suite - that is, my university track bottoms and an old sweatshirt. Something else the doctor has ordered, more exercise. That and less alcohol. One is easier to abide by than the other, I’ll let you guess which.

Point is, it was likely enough that she’d run into me here, but all that sounds stupid and inconsequential, so I let her pull me into a hug. It was as if she’s genuinely glad to see me. “I.” Hastily, I clear my throat. “I definitely wasn’t expecting to see you, Mrs. P.” I gesture down at myself. “Otherwise I would have gussied up more.” 

She laughs, “Don’t be absurd, Oliver. It’s always nice to see you, whatever the circumstance. But isn’t this a bit far to come for your morning run?” 

Then I remember. The last correspondence that I had sent Dr. and Mrs. S. Perlman was last Hanukkah, when members of the family, myself, my wife R___, my sons all sent love “across the Atlantic in this miraculous time” from our old address in Midtown. Somehow, it doesn’t surprise me that Annella would recall such a trivial detail. 

I say, “I’ve uh, moved. I actually live just around the corner from here.” I am careful not to give any more specifics. They’re unnecessary, a detriment to small talk. But perhaps Annella has already seen right through me. I can’t quite tell. Anyway, I am eager to move on from the subject. 

“I see,” Annella says. She makes a point of looking at her watch, and I grow hopeful, despite myself. 

“I’m sorry to keep you,” I say. “I’m sure you have somewhere to be.” 

“Oh, no.” Annella shakes her head. “I’m recently free of my motherly duties, until next time of course, Elio insisted he had to study today and that I should still have a few days to enjoy myself in the city.” She laughs, as if the sentiment was somehow absurd.

Mostly, I just try to keep a straight face. This time, it’s imperative that Annella doesn’t suspect a thing. “Twenty-two-year-old graduates-to-bes don’t exactly need their mothers hovering over them, do they?” 

She seems to take her own words in stride. We are worlds apart, Annella Perlman and me. While she can take it in stride that her brood suddenly has no use for her. I live in fear of a version of that, every weekend. My ex-wife is thankfully not a vengeful person, but sooner or later, I have a feeling that my boys will discard me all the same. 

“He’s twenty-two?” I don’t quite trust myself to say Elio’s name. In my experience, it’s always been a quick tumble into quicksand. And I am no longer the brave man I fancy myself to be, if I ever was.

“Time flies, doesn’t it? How old are your boys now?” 

“The twins just turned five. Just started kindergarten,” I say. “A long way from twenty-two.”

“For now,” Annella says, with one of those smiles that says I’ll know better than to think that (but in time). “But I wouldn’t want to keep you, Oliver, if you’re busy.” 

“I have the day off,” I say. “Honestly I’m not doing much except lamenting my breakfast. You should see the state of my fridge.” I’ve said too much. I regret the words that have just come out of my mouth without thought, but it’s too late. I also like to tell myself that I have changed in the five and a half years she’s seen me; for one thing, I try not to lie when I can help it. 

A yellow cab stops at the corner near where we are standing, and Annella waves hello to the driver before motioning towards me. She says, “I’d rather you not lament your breakfast.” Her tone makes this decision a grave mis-step within the tree of life, so much so that I feel the dormant guilt in my stomach beginning to shift up towards my throat. Soon, it’ll be impossible to mistake that for hunger, although I am pretty hungry. 

Annella adds, “Why don’t you join me for breakfast? I’m terrible at making decisions in strange cities.”

New York is indeed a sprawling secret city. I don’t consider myself a New Yorker, although I’ve lived here for half a decade; every day, it seems that some new strangeness awaits me. I laugh, and I see it, a flicker of relief in Annella’s expression. “I know exactly what you mean.”

In the end, I convince Annella to forego the taxi and we walk arm in arm to Irving Farm, only a couple of minutes away for the best coffee in New York, and the food isn’t too shabby either. We must look ridiculous, but hardly anyone spares us a glance. There are positives to take away from a city so taken with strange, with the new. I am not ungrateful; I know it’s not all bad. There’s an Irving Farm too, near where I used to live in Midtown, and while I’m certainly not making important life choices based on my proximity to good coffee, I like to think it helps. 

My familiarity with the place seems to impress Annella. Most of the people who work there know me to some extent, even if just to spare a second to think, “Hey, it’s that idiot again.” and we’re shepherded to where I usually sit, a corner table next to a bunch of sockets. I’m asked if I want my usual by the girl standing by the coffee machine. 

Annella asks, “What is your usual?” 

Ever since I’ve lost my study at the apartment, I make a point of not bringing work home. It’d been something R____ had complained about, but unlike everything else that had precipitated our divorce, this had been an easy fix. However, I do tire of working in my office at the university, and so now I drink more coffee than I should, in a bid to work elsewhere. 

“I have their dark roast,” I say, nodding briefly at the girl, who then gets to work. “I used to have it black, but now I’m not allowed. But it’s still good with a bit of milk.” 

“Oh?”

“Acid reflux,” I say, shrugging. “My doc would have my head.” 

“Samuel had this problem too,” Annella says, now with an indulgent smile about her mouth. “If you want my opinion, you academics always work too hard. But he’s quit caffeine cold-turkey.”

“And he’s retired,” I say. “That probably helps. Is Pro at least trying to enjoy it?” Something else I’m pretty good at, all things considered, is living vicariously through others. The fact that I’m probably never going to retire and paying my college debt, plus the college debts of my sons, neither of these things escape me. 

“The way he acts around the house always holed up in his study, you wouldn’t know it.” It’s Annella’s turn to smile at the girl when she drops off our identical coffees and menus. A not-so subtle hint, I make a note to have a meal the next time I come in here again. 

I’m surprised by how hungry I am, but that’s not exactly a bad thing. It’s a good excuse not to talk too much. I don’t usually go in for avocado toast anything, but today has already been so strange. But Annella hardly mentions it. 

Instead, she says, “I feel as if I should apologize to you, Oliver.”

I look up from the fresh yellow yolk running off the edge of my bread. My sons used to fight over who gets to break the yolk over Daddy’s toast every morning. But now that I live alone, it seems like so much work. “...Apologize to me? Why?” 

“I thought you and Elio would still be in contact, but it would appear that I’ve picked at a scabbed over wound. Such is the peril of motherhood.” 

I reach for more of my coffee. “I still don’t quite understand why you’re apologizing to me. It’s probably my fault that we haven’t caught up. I’ve just...been busy. I think I did call Elio once, but on a weekend. Bad idea.” I’ve said his name and I feel fine. It will take some time for ElioElioElio to infect me. By now, I’m an old hand and less afraid than I was. 

“I know, with your family, and your sons.” Out of kindness, perhaps, Annella doesn’t mention R____. She doesn’t sound at all angry with me, and whereas the absoluteness of her sincerity should rub me the wrong way, it doesn’t. “But he was the happiest that I’d ever seen him during the summer when you visited us in B. I supposed that was why I asked after you, but in reality I was only asking out of my own selfishness. I asked because I thought it’d make him happy.” 

“I can’t imagine you and Elio fighting about anything,” I admit. Least of all me, but I keep that to myself. 

“Of course we do,” she says with a tilt of her head. “But we do try not to do it too often. Especially now that he’s across the Atlantic and on his own.” 

“I should have reached out to him anyway,” I say. “I should have found the time.” 

Annella shakes her head. “But that’s what I’ve been trying to say, Oliver. As a mother, I wish my son endless happiness. But it’s happiness that he has to find on his own, and it’s unfair to push that on you.”

I hesitate to think of the future I want for my sons. A lifetime of misery defined by the briefest of euphoric happiness. 

I say, “Is he happy?” 

Annella looks at me and she reaches to touch my hand. “I think he is, as much as one can be. Recently he’s been further away from me. But you can ask him yourself, if you’d like. I’m sure he’ll be glad to hear from you.”

Elio picks up on the second ring, and I nearly lose my nerve. I’m not even this nervous speaking to my ex-wife’s lawyer. But then, I’m usually a nervous person. Even now, he reminds me of who I am. 

“This is Elio. Hello? Hello?” 

I draw in a deep breath and let it out. 

“Hello,” I say in a small voice. “It’s me.” 

There is a very long pause at the other end, and I think I can see it, delicate dark brows furrowing under a mass of curls, trying to figure out _what I want_. 

I rarely know what I want, but maybe this time I don’t want anything. It’s enough just to hear his voice and have the proverbial door not slam in my face suddenly. 

Finally, Elio says, “Hello, me. Are you all right?” 

“I’m all right,” I say, and I am bright with hope.


End file.
